Date: Wed, Jul 5, 2000 5:00 AM
A bloated and sullen sun, or what was intended to appear as one, hung
interminably above a horizon shrouded in caustic vapors. Satan's mood
matched this somber setting, and JHVH-1's wasn't much better.
"I'm telling you he CHEATS, He doesn't play by ANY RULES."
"Oh, cram it Yahweh. Sometimes you sound like a spoiled brat."
"Hey, don't forget who got you this job."
"Oh right, undying gratitude here. How could I have ever forgotten. I
only get to torture what YOU have already tortured."
"And I hate your taste in decor."
"So invite me upstairs, bitch. You think having you down for these
meetings is my idea of fun?"
The demented Evil Alien and his only more overt evil employee
commiserated for a while in silence. Then JHVH-1 began to pace.
"Where ARE they? Two years. TWO FUCKING YEARS. We had a DEAL. A
CONTRACT..."
* POOF *
"Well, hey howdy gentlemen, did I hear my name called?" Whisps of smoke
curled lazily from his pipe, adding a whiff of 'frop to the stifling,
sulfurous air.
"Don't DO that Dobbs. Me damn it, I hate those stage tricks."
"Yeah, says the mighty deluge maker and locust herder..."
"Hey the locusts were your idea remember."
"Guys, come now, time's a wastin', and entropy's galloping on. We've got
a world to end, let's get to work." His grin cut through the funk and
JHVH-1 smiled a bit.
"Yeah, right, sure. Harvest time. We've got souls to sell. So, tell me
Dobbs, where is that saucer fleet you promised? You know these so called
evolved critters go for that sort of stuff now, not my old thunder and
lightning routine."
"Well, besides the fact that 'where' isn't an answerable as far as the
X-ists are concerned, there's a bit of a hitch."
The two evil metabeings glared impatiently, waiting while "Bob" relit
his pipe.
"You see, they're on to us."
"Who? The X-ists?", Satan glanced at JHVH-1 and back to "Bob". "Of
course they were in on it. You showed them the contract. They signed
it."
"No, I mean the earth beings. Well, some of them anyway."
"Oh shit. Oh shit. "Bob", what have you done?"
"Me? Oh ho, Jee-hov, I haven't done anything except a little cash
collection and preaching, no more than your own followers. It's just
that, well, some of them kind of figured out some stuff, and,
well......."
"WHAT STUFF?"
"Time control."
"WHAT?"
"Yeah, they learned to bend it."
"But that was my favorite part. It made thermodynamics work so
everything would run down."
"It's worse than that though."
"Oh no."
"They've forked it."
JHVH-1 sat heavily onto the glowing boulder and slumped visibly. "They
broke it?", he asked weakly.
=====
A solitary figure sat in a high backed leather chair, bathed in monitor
glow. Screens flickered and data streamed past in dense clouds, half
unseen, half directly absorbed through the ribbon cables leading to a
molded silver cap on his head.
A phone started to ring. Although he didn't move, it cut off in
mid-ring.
"Y.G.R.I."
"They're here. Split the time stream." <CLICK>
Two blinks and he seemed to wake. Turning his head slightly he gazed at
the display of a character set, and characters started to flash one
after the other, thousands per second. A minute later he called out,
"Sweetheart?"
From upstairs, "What?"
"Darling?"
"Oh shit."
"You can stop packing. I have to work. Do, uh, do you have the keys to
the copter?"
"Yes, and I'm driving. If we can't go at least I want to see it."
He sighed and rose from the chair, laying aside his helmet. "I'll feed
the cats. Can you get the temporal destabilizer?"
"Where did you leave it?"
"Um......."
"Never mind. I'll find it."
He wanted to be in the copter before he told her about the "new" kittens
they had.
=====
The lights at the Sherman exit glowed sodium yellow in a dawn of the
same color. As the flew above them and turned south, he flicked a switch
and the craft became silent except for the whistle of wind outside.
"Bearing 205, range 3.10."
"I know here it's at."
". . . . . . . ."
"Oh stop pouting. Here, you can look through the scope and fire the
neural scrambler."
"...alright"
"Kids."
As they passed over the hill the camp ground came into view. They slowed
over the main building and slid silently to just over the trailer.
"OK, I have their signals. They're all in there."
A sonic boom rolled over them from high altitude. A speck of flame grew
far above.
She looked up through the cockpit and said, "They're here. Do it. We
can't have the Church elders waking up now, they'll see the shift."
"Firing." A hum and that was all. "Got them. Good until 8 at least."
"Excellent. Ready to shift?"
"Me? I thought you brought the..."
"OH NO."
"Just kidding."
He hit a button on the console, and
the universe twitched
Stang rolled over in bed and snored
the saucers fired their beam weapons
the Earth disappeared
the beams cut through empty space and into the saucers on the opposite
side of where the globe had been
an alien voice said "Dammit, "Bob"" just before it was whisked back to
an imaginary dimension
and Brushwood, and the planet it protected, continued to exist in a
slightly different universe, not knowing the difference.
"Radar shows clear. Let's go home."
"Wait, it's 7. Someone's up. Who is that?"
"Looks like Troutwaxer."
"So it is. Can I send him a message?"
"You know the rules. No tampering until the temporal waves dampen out."
"Aw, man....."
"Pouting won't help."
"... Can I have some ice cream?"
"Sure."
"Can we go next year?"
"Can you talk "Bob" into not fiddling with the time stream?"
"I guess that depends on the price he gets and how much Church Air we
have."
"Well, there ya go then."
"And whether the X-ists are able to track the temporal
destabilizations."
She didn't reply. He could be a spoiled brat, but he was, after all, a
Doktor. He'd figure out how to keep the X-ists at bay until Dobbs gave
the word.
Silently the craft departed, leaving the campers to go on about the
lives that had a purpose which no one knew what it was.
=====
"And so you see, JHVH," "Bob" finished, "I figure every shift just ups
the price. And that means You get a bigger cut."
"But we're hungry NOW."
"I know, and I sympathize. So are the X-ists. But you've trusted me this
far, and now you're going to have to continue to trust me because it's
not all up to me anymore."
JHVH-1 and Satan were clearly weary of "Bob's" interminable good natured
rambling. "Look, we don't have forever," started Satan.
"No, you've got a limited amount of time, I know. But now they've got an
unlimited number of limited amounts of time. And that means space. And
that means cash from the X-ists. See what I'm saying?"
They didn't, but then they didn't care anymore. It was well past 7.
"Hey, look on the bright side. There's always next year."
"Shut up, "Bob"", they said in unison.
=====
In the monitor glow he sat with his helmet on, eyes seeing more than
they screens showed.
She set his ice cream down next to him. "Anything good on?"
"Nah. No Palmer in weeks. Bloxy's is still hiding at COTSE. A couple new
kooks, but nothing great." He dug into the ice cream.
"You never told me where you get the idea for the destabilizer."
"Idea? No idea. "Bob" gave me that."
"It figures. So, no Rupture until he gets his price?"
He grinned at his ice cream. "Hey, look on the bright side. There's
always next year."
=====
Doktor DynaSoar,
Yetii Genetii Research InstiToot,
7 AM, July 5, AX 2, timestream 3
Original file name: Conspicuous Absence
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